The original main building, the first totally enclosed film stage and studio in history, is still standing. It is located at 1712 Glendale Blvd in Echo Park, Los Angeles and is now being used as a storage facility.[5]

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The studio is perhaps best remembered for the era under Mack Sennett when he created the slapstick antics of the Keystone Cops, from 1912, and for the Sennett Bathing Beauties, beginning in 1915. Charlie Chaplin got his start at Keystone when Sennett hired him fresh from his vaudeville career to make silent films. Charlie Chaplin at Keystone Studios is a 1993 compilation of some of the most notable films Chaplin made at Keystone, documenting his transition from vaudeville player to true comic film actor to director. In 1915, Keystone Studios became an autonomous production unit of the Triangle Film Corporation with D. W. Griffith and Thomas Ince. In 1917, Sennett gave up the Keystone trademark and organized his own company.

Sennett, by then a celebrity, departed the studio in 1917 to produce his own independent films (eventually distributed through Paramount). Keystone's business decreased after his departure, and finally closed after bankruptcy in 1935.

Marie Dressler was a Canadian-American stage and screen actress and early silent film and Depression-era film star. Successful on stage in vaudeville and comic operas, she was successful in film. In 1914, she was in the first full-length film comedy, leaving home at the age of 14, Dressler built a career on stage in traveling theatre troupes. While not conventionally beautiful, she learned early to appreciate her talent in making people laugh, in 1892, she started a career on Broadway that lasted into the 1920s, performing comedic roles that allowed her to improvise to get laughs. From one of her successful Broadway roles, she played the role in the first full-length screen comedy, 1914s Tillies Punctured Romance, opposite Charles Chaplin. She would make several shorts but mostly worked in New York City on stage, during World War I, along with other celebrities, she helped sell Liberty Bonds. In 1919, she helped organize the first union for stage chorus players and her career declined in the 1920s and Dressler was reduced to living on her savings while sharing an apartment with a friend.

In 1927, she returned to films at the age of 59 and she won the Academy Award for Best Actress in 1930–31 for Min and Bill and was named the top film star for 1932 and 1933. She died of cancer in 1934, leilas elder sister was Bonita Louise Koerber, who married playwright Richard Ganthony. Her father was a teacher in Cobourg and the organist at St. PetersAnglican Church. According to Dressler, the family moved from community to community during her childhood. It has been suggested by Cobourg historian Andrew Hewson that Dressler attended a private school and her first known acting appearance was as Cupid at age five in a church theatrical performance in Lindsay, Ontario. Residents of the towns the Koerbers lived in recalled Dressler acting in amateur productions. Dressler left home at 14 to begin her career with the Nevada Stock Company. The pay was either $6 or $8 per week, and Dressler sent half to her mother and it was at this time that Dressler adopted the name of an aunt as her stage name.

According to Dressler, her father objected to her using the name of Koerber, the identity of the aunt was never confirmed, though Dressler denied that she adopted the name from a store awning. Dresslers sister Bonita, five years older, left home at about the same time, Bonita worked in the opera company. The Nevada Stock Company was a company that played mostly in the American Midwest

Triangle Film Corporation was a major American motion-picture studio, founded in July 1915 in Culver City, California. The studio was founded in July 1915 by Harry and Roy Aitken, Harry was D. W. Griffiths partner at Reliance-Majestic Studios, both parted with the Mutual Film Corporation in the wake of The Birth of a Nations unexpected success that year. Triangle was envisioned as a studio based on the producing abilities of filmmakers D. W. Griffith, Thomas Ince. On November 23,1915, the Triangle Film Corporation opened a state-of-the-art motion picture theater in Massillon, the Lincoln Theater is still an operational movie theater owned and operated by the Massillon Lions Club. The theater has been restored and is host to a film festival dedicated to the films of Dorothy. Eventually, the studio suffered from bloat, by 1917, producer Adolph Zukor had taken control of all of the studios assets. In June 1917, Thomas H. Ince and Mack Sennett left the company, Triangle continued to produce films until 1919 when it ceased operations.

Films using the Triangle name were released to the general public until 1923. With the exception of Oh, Mabel Behave, all of Triangles films were released between 1915 and 1919, most films were made on the West Coast, but some of Triangles production took place in Fort Lee, New Jersey. La Triangle - Cinéma, Archives and history at the Cinémathèque française Strategic failure of the Triangle - Marc Vernet

Sir Charles SpencerCharlie Chaplin, KBE was an English comic actor and composer who rose to fame during the era of silent film. Chaplin became an icon through his screen persona the Tramp and is considered one of the most important figures in the history of the film industry. His career spanned more than 75 years, from childhood in the Victorian era until a year before his death in 1977, Chaplins childhood in London was one of poverty and hardship. As his father was absent and his mother struggled financially, he was sent to a workhouse twice before the age of nine, when he was 14, his mother was committed to a mental asylum. Chaplin began performing at an age, touring music halls and working as a stage actor. At 19 he was signed to the prestigious Fred Karno company, Chaplin was scouted for the film industry, and began appearing in 1914 for Keystone Studios. He soon developed the Tramp persona and formed a fan base. Chaplin directed his own films from a stage, and continued to hone his craft as he moved to the Essanay, Mutual.

By 1918, he was one of the best known figures in the world, in 1919, Chaplin co-founded the distribution company United Artists, which gave him complete control over his films. His first feature-length was The Kid, followed by A Woman of Paris, The Gold Rush and he refused to move to sound films in the 1930s, instead producing City Lights and Modern Times without dialogue. Chaplin became increasingly political, and his film, The Great Dictator. The 1940s were a decade marked with controversy for Chaplin, and he was accused of communist sympathies, while his involvement in a paternity suit and marriages to much younger women caused scandal. An FBI investigation was opened, and Chaplin was forced to leave the United States and he abandoned the Tramp in his films, which include Monsieur Verdoux, Limelight, A King in New York, and A Countess from Hong Kong. Chaplin wrote, produced, starred in and he was a perfectionist, and his financial independence enabled him to spend years on the development and production of a picture.

His films are characterised by slapstick combined with pathos, typified in the Tramps struggles against adversity, many contain social and political themes, as well as autobiographical elements. In 1972, as part of an appreciation for his work. He continues to be held in regard, with The Gold Rush, City Lights, Modern Times. Charles Spencer Chaplin was born on 16 April 1889 to Hannah Chaplin, there is no official record of his birth, although Chaplin believed he was born at East Street, Walworth, in South London

The Fatal Mallet is a 1914 American-made motion picture starring Charles Chaplin and Mabel Normand. The film was written and directed by Mack Sennett, who one of Chaplins rivals for Normands attention. Three men will fight for the love of a charming girl and one other suitor teams up against the third, and play dirty, throwing bricks and using a mallet. However, Charlie double-crosses his partner, thus losing his trust and the girl in the end

Harold Clayton Lloyd, Sr. was an American actor, film director, film producer and stunt performer who is most famous for his silent comedy films. Harold Lloyd ranks alongside Charlie Chaplin and Buster Keaton as one of the most popular, Lloyd made nearly 200 comedy films, both silent and talkies, between 1914 and 1947. He is best known for his bespectacled Glass character, a resourceful and his films frequently contained thrill sequences of extended chase scenes and daredevil physical feats, for which he is best remembered today. Lloyd hanging from the hands of a high above the street in Safety Last. is one of the most enduring images in all of cinema. Lloyd did many of these dangerous stunts himself, despite having injured himself in August 1919 while doing publicity pictures for the Roach studio, an accident with a bomb mistaken as a prop resulted in the loss of the thumb and index finger of his right hand. Although Lloyds individual films were not as successful as Chaplins on average, he was far more prolific.

Lloyd was born in Burchard, Nebraska, on April 20,1893, to James Darsie Lloyd and Sarah Elisabeth Fraser, in 1910, after his father succumbed to several failed business ventures, Lloyds parents divorced and his father moved with his son to San Diego. Lloyd had acted in theater since a child, but in California he began acting in film comedies around 1912. Lloyd worked with Thomas Edisons motion picture company, and his first role was a part as a Yaqui Indian in the production of The Old Monks Tale. At the age of 20, Harold moved to Los Angeles and he was hired by Universal as an extra and soon became friends with aspiring filmmaker, Hal Roach. Lloyd began collaborating with Roach who had formed his own studio in 1913, Roach and Lloyd created Lonesome Luke, similar to and playing off the success of Charlie Chaplin films. Lloyd hired Bebe Daniels as an actress in 1914, the two of them were involved romantically and were known as The Boy and The Girl. In 1919, she left Lloyd to pursue her dramatic aspirations, Lloyd replaced Daniels with Mildred Davis in 1919.

Lloyd was tipped off by Hal Roach to watch Davis in a movie, the more Lloyd watched Davis the more he liked her. Lloyds first reaction in seeing her was that she looked like a big French doll, by 1918, Lloyd and Roach had begun to develop his character beyond an imitation of his contemporaries. Harold Lloyd would move away from tragicomic personas, and portray an everyman with unwavering confidence, the Glass character is said to have been created after Roach suggested that Harold was too handsome to do comedy without some sort of disguise. When I adopted the glasses, he recalled in a 1962 interview with Harry Reasoner, it more or less put me in a different category because I became a human being. He was a kid that you would meet next door, across the street, but at the same time I could still do all the things that we did before

Chester Cooper Conklin was an American comedic actor who appeared in over 280 films, about half of them in the silent film era. Conklin, one of three children, grew up in a violent household, when he was eight, his mother was found burned to death in the family garden. Although first judged a suicide, his father, a religious man who hoped his son would be a minister, was eventually charged with murder. Conklin won first prize when he gave a recitation at a community festival, a few years later, he ran away from home after vowing to a friend he would never return, a promise he kept. Heading to Des Moines he found employment as a hotel bellhop, in St. Sennett directed him in his first film, a comedy short titled Hubbys Job. In 1914, Conklin co-starred with Mabel Normand in a series of films, Mabels Strange Predicament, Mabels New Job, Mabels Busy Day, in that same year he appeared in Making a Living, in which Charlie Chaplin made his film debut. He would go on to more than a dozen films with Chaplin while at Keystone.

Years later, Conklin would perform with Chaplin in two more films, first in 1936 in Modern Times and in 1940s The Great Dictator. During this time, Chaplin kept Conklin on year-round salary, while at Keystone, Conklin became most famous when he was teamed up with the robust comic Mack Swain to make a series of comedies. Beyond these Ambrose & Walrus comedies, the two appeared together in different films. He worked at the Famous Players-Lasky Corporation studio. C, which had nothing to do with the 1914 Chaplin version aside from the title. Paramount Pictures teamed up Conklin and Fields for a series of films between 1927 and 1931. Conklin appeared in films which appealed to nostalgia for the silent era, such as Hollywood Cavalcade, in Soundies musicals, he appeared with other silent-comedy alumni as The Keystone Kops, as well as on the televised This Is Your Life tribute to Mack Sennett. Conklin was part of Preston Sturges unofficial stock company of actors in the 1940s. In 1957, he was a guest challenger on the TV panel show To Tell The Truth, conklins career hit bottom in the 1950s, and he took work as a department-store Santa Claus to make ends meet.

In the 1960s, Conklin was living at the Motion Picture Country Home and Hospital when he fell in love with another patient there, June Gunther. The two got married in Las Vegas in 1965, his marriage and her fourth, and set up housekeeping in Van Nuys, the groom was seventy-nine. Conklin made one last film after that, a Western comedy, A Big Hand for the Little Lady, Chester Conklin died in Autumn 1971 in California at the age of 85

Bernard Ben Turpin was an American comedian and actor, best remembered for his work in silent films. Turpin was born in New Orleans, Louisiana on September 19,1869, the son of a store owner, Ernest Turpin. Turpin and his first wife, actress Carrie Lemieux, were married in Chicago on February 18,1907, in 1923, Mrs. Turpin became ill with influenza, which caused the loss of her hearing. Heartbroken, Turpin took his seriously ill wife to the Basilica of Sainte-Anne-de-Beaupré in Quebec and she eventually became an invalid, with Turpin placing his career on hold to care for her. Carrie died on October 2,1925, Turpin remarried on July 8,1926 to Babette Dietz in Los Angeles. He was a Roman Catholic, and a member of the Good Shepherd Parish, Turpin worked in vaudeville and circuses. He had an appearance, with a small wiry frame, a brush mustache. Turpins famous eyes, he said, only crossed as an adult after he suffered an accident. He was a devout Catholic, and his workmates occasionally goaded him by threatening to pray that his eyes would uncross, Turpin famously bought a $25,000 insurance policy with Lloyds of London, payable if his eyes ever uncrossed. A1920 version of the story had his eyes insured for $100,000, how serious this was is open to question, such publicity stunts centered around a performers trademark were common at the time.

He developed a style of physical comedy, including an ability to stage comic pratfalls that impressed even his fellow workers in the rough-and-tumble world of silent comedy. One of his specialties was a forward tumble he called the hundred an eight and it was basically an interrupted forward somersault initiated by kicking one leg up, turning over 180 degrees to land flat on the back or in a seated position. Ben Turpin first appeared on film in 1907 for Essanay Studios in Chicago in various small parts, in addition to his on-screen work, he worked as a carpenter and janitor for Essanay. In the 1909 film Mr. Flip, Turpin receives what is believed to have been the first pie-in-the-face, by 1912 he was an established — if not major — screen personality, giving interviews and writing articles for the new fan magazines. Charlie Chaplin joined the Essanay company in 1915, and the studio made Turpin his second banana, Chaplin was maturing as a filmmaker, working slowly and intuitively. Turpin, was impatient with Chaplins methods, the earthy Turpin understood straightforward slapstick more than comic subtlety.

The Chaplin-Turpin duo didnt last long, with Chaplin abandoning Chicago for California, Essanay did not survive Chaplins departure and remained solvent for only a few more years. Turpin may have been aware of Essanays instability, he left for the Vogue comedy company, former Essanay comedian Paddy McQuire supported him

L. A. Noire is a neo-noir detective action-adventure video game developed by Team Bondi and published by Rockstar Games. It was initially released for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 platforms on 17 May 2011, L. A. Noire is set in Los Angeles in 1947 and challenges the player, controlling a Los Angeles Police Department officer, to solve a range of cases across five divisions. Players must investigate crime scenes for clues, follow up leads, and interrogate suspects, the game uses a distinctive colour palette, but in homage to film noir it includes the option to play the game in black and white. Various plot elements reference the major themes of detective and mobster stories such as The Naked City, The Untouchables, The Black Dahlia, and L. A. Confidential. The technology is central to the games interrogation mechanic, as players must use the suspects reactions to questioning to judge whether or not they are lying, L. A. Noire was the first video game to be shown at the Tribeca Film Festival. Upon release, the game received acclaim for its advances in storytelling.

As of February 2012, both PC and console versions had shipped nearly 5 million copies combined, L. A. Noire is an action-adventure neo-noir crime game played from a third-person perspective. Players complete cases—linear scenarios with set objectives—to progress through the story, the game features a mode which allows players to freely roam the open world. In this mode, players can engage in optional activities. The world features multiple landmarks, which are all based on real monuments from 1940s Los Angeles. The game takes place in the city of Los Angeles, in the year 1947, with players assuming the role of Los Angeles Police Department officer, and detective, Cole Phelps. The game starts with Phelps as a patrolman, and follows his career as he advances through the police department bureaus of Traffic, Vice. Each desk gives players a new partner who will help Phelps in his investigation of a number of based on a specific type of crime. The game assigns players with cases that they must solve, after each case, players receive a rating of 1–5 stars depending on their performance in both interrogations and searching for clues.

In some cases, when searching an area for clues to the crime, besides reading the story, the newspapers give access to a short cinematic that either covers a part of the games overarching plot or a flashback to Phelps war memories. The game blends investigative elements with fast-paced action sequences, including chases, interrogations, players use melee attacks and firearms to fight enemies, and may run, jump or use vehicles to navigate the world. In combat, auto-aim and a system can be used as assistance against enemies. Should player characters take damage, the health will gradually regenerate

A silent film is a film with no synchronized recorded sound, especially with no spoken dialogue. The silent film era lasted from 1895 to 1936, in silent films for entertainment, the dialogue is transmitted through muted gestures and title cards which contain a written indication of the plot or key dialogue. During silent films, a pianist, theatre organist, or, in large cities and organists would either play from sheet music or improvise, an orchestra would play from sheet music. The term silent film is therefore a retronym—that is, a term created to distinguish something retroactively, the early films with sound, starting with The Jazz Singer in 1927, were referred to as talkies, sound films, or talking pictures. A September 2013 report by the United States Library of Congress announced that a total of 70% of American silent feature films are believed to be completely lost, the earliest precursors of film began with image projection through the use of a device known as the magic lantern. This utilized a glass lens, a shutter and a persistent light source, such as a powerful lantern and these slides were originally hand-painted, but still photographs were used on after the technological advent of photography in the nineteenth century.

The invention of a practical photography apparatus preceded cinema by only fifty years, the next significant step towards film creation was the development of an understanding of image movement. Simulations of movement date as far back as to 1828 and only four years after Paul Roget discovered the phenomenon he called Persistence of Vision. This experience was further demonstrated through Rogets introduction of the thaumatrope, the first projected primary proto-movie was made by Eadweard Muybridge between 1877 and 1880. Muybridge set up a row of cameras along a racetrack and timed image exposures to capture the many stages of a horses gallop, the oldest surviving film was created by Louis Le Prince in 1888. It was a film of people walking in Oakwood streets garden. Edison made a business of selling Kinetograph and Kinetoscope equipment, due to Edisons lack of securing an international patent on his film inventions, similar devices were invented around the world. The Lumière brothers, for example, created the Cinématographe in France, the Cinématographe proved to be a more portable and practical device than both of Edisons as it combined a camera, film processor and projector in one unit.

In contrast to Edisons peepshow-style kinetoscope, which one person could watch through a viewer. Their first film, Sortie de lusine Lumière de Lyon, shot in 1894, is considered the first true motion picture, the invention of celluloid film, which was strong and flexible, greatly facilitated the making of motion pictures. This film was 35 mm wide and pulled using four sprocket holes and this doomed the cinematograph, which could only use film with just one sprocket hole. From the very beginnings of film production, the art of motion pictures grew into maturity in the silent era. Silent filmmakers pioneered the art form to the extent that virtually every style, the silent era was pioneering era from a technical point of view

Slapstick is a style of humor involving exaggerated physical activity which exceeds the boundaries of normal physical comedy. The term arises from a device developed during the broad, physical comedy style known as Commedia dellarte in 16th Century Italy, the physical slap stick remains a key component of the plot in the traditional and popular Punch and Judy puppet show. The name slapstick originates from the Italian language word batacchio or bataccio — called the stick in English — a club-like object composed of two wooden slats used in commedia dellarte. When struck, the batacchio produces a loud smacking noise, though little force transfers from the object to the person being struck, actors may thus hit one another repeatedly with great audible effect while causing very little actual physical damage. Along with the bladder, it was among the earliest special effects. Slapstick comedys history is measured in centuries, shakespeare incorporated many chase scenes and beatings into his comedies, such as in his play The Comedy of Errors.

Vaudeville is a theatrical genre of variety entertainment. It was especially popular in the United States and Canada from the early 1880s until the early 1930s, a typical vaudeville performance is made up of a series of separate, unrelated acts grouped together on a common bill. A vaudeville performer is often referred to as a vaudevillian, Vaudeville developed from many sources, including the concert saloon, freak shows, dime museums, and literary American burlesque. Called the heart of American show business, vaudeville was one of the most popular types of entertainment in North America for several decades, the origin of this term is obscure, but is often explained as being derived from the French expression voix de ville. A second speculation is that it comes from the songs on satire by poet Olivier Basselin. Some, preferred the term variety to what manager Tony Pastor called its sissy. Thus, vaudeville was marketed as variety well into the 20th century, with its first subtle appearances within the early 1860s, vaudeville was not initially a common form of entertainment.

The form gradually evolved from the saloon and variety hall into its mature form throughout the 1870s and 1880s. This more gentle form was known as Polite Vaudeville, in the years before the American Civil War, entertainment existed on a different scale. Certainly, variety theatre existed before 1860 in Europe and elsewhere, in the US, as early as the first decades of the 19th century, theatregoers could enjoy a performance consisting of Shakespeare plays, singing and comedy. As the years progressed, people seeking diversified amusement found a number of ways to be entertained. Vaudeville was characterized by traveling companies touring through cities and towns, a significant influence came from Dutch minstrels and comedians. Vaudeville incorporated these various itinerant amusements into a stable, institutionalized form centered in Americas growing urban hubs, pastors experiment proved successful, and other managers soon followed suit. B. F. Keith took the step, starting in Boston. Later, E. F.

Albee, adoptive grandfather of the Pulitzer Prize-winning playwrightEdward Albee, circuits such as those managed by Keith-Albee provided vaudevilles greatest economic innovation and the principal source of its industrial strength. They enabled a chain of allied vaudeville houses that remedied the chaos of the booking system by contracting acts for regional and national tours. These could easily be lengthened from a few weeks to two years, Albee gave national prominence to vaudevilles trumpeting polite entertainment, a commitment to entertainment equally inoffensive to men and children. Acts that violated this ethos were admonished and threatened with expulsion from the remaining performances or were canceled altogether

Mack Sennett was a Canadian-American film actor, director, and producer, and studio head, known as the King of Comedy. — Born in Canada, he started in films in the Biograph company of New York, and later opened Keystone Studios in Edendale …

Silver Lake is a residential and commercial neighborhood in the central region of Los Angeles, California, United States. Originally named Ivanhoe in the 1900s by a resident from Scotland, it was built around what was then a city reservoir which gives the district its name. The "Silver" in Silver …

Sir Charles Spencer Chaplin was an English comic actor, filmmaker, and composer who rose to fame in the era of silent film. He became a worldwide icon through his screen persona, "The Tramp", and is considered one of the most important figures in the history of …

Vaudeville is a theatrical genre of variety entertainment born in France at the end of the 18th century. A vaudeville was originally a comedy without psychological or moral intentions, based on a comical situation: a kind of dramatic composition or light poetry, interspersed …

As the genre declined, most performers left the theatre. The child tap dancer Ray Wollbrinck, once called "the cleverest buckdancer on the vaudeville stage", later became a bandleader and ended his days as a bank teller.

A silent film is a film with no synchronized recorded sound. In silent films for entertainment, the plot may be conveyed by the use of title cards, written indications of the plot and key dialogue lines. The idea of combining motion pictures with recorded …

Scene still of Belshazzar's feast in the central courtyard of Babylon from D. W. Griffith's 1916 silent film Intolerance.

Lillian Gish, the "First Lady of the American Cinema", was a leading star in the silent era with one of the longest careers—1912 to 1987.

David Wark Griffith was an American director, writer, and producer who pioneered modern cinematic techniques. He is remembered for The Birth of a Nation and Intolerance. The Birth of a Nation made use of advanced camera and narrative techniques, and …

Thomas Harper Ince was an American silent film producer, director, screenwriter, and actor. — Ince was known as the "Father of the Western" and was responsible for making over 800 films. He revolutionized the motion picture industry by creating the first major …

Roscoe Conkling "Fatty" Arbuckle was an American silent film actor, comedian, director, and screenwriter. Starting at the Selig Polyscope Company he eventually moved to Keystone Studios, where he worked with Mabel Normand and Harold Lloyd. He mentored Charlie …

Mabel Ethelreid Normand was an American silent-film actress, screenwriter, director, and producer. She was a popular star and collaborator of Mack Sennett in his Keystone Studios films, and at the height of her career in the late 1910s and early 1920s, had …

Harold Clayton Lloyd Sr. was an American actor, comedian, director, producer, screenwriter, and stunt performer who is best known for his silent comedy films.Lloyd ranks alongside Charlie Chaplin and Buster Keaton as one of the most popular and influential film …

Lloyd in 1924

Lloyd in 1946, when he was appointed to the Shriners' publicity committee

Gloria May Josephine Swanson was an American actress and producer. She achieved widespread critical acclaim and recognition for her role as Norma Desmond, a reclusive silent film star, in the critically acclaimed 1950 film Sunset Boulevard. The film earned her an …

Bernard "Ben" Turpin was an American comedian and actor, best remembered for his work in silent films. His trademarks were his cross-eyed appearance and adeptness at vigorous physical comedy. Turpin worked with notable performers such as Charlie Chaplin and …

Paramount Pictures Corporation is an American film studio based in Hollywood, California, that has been a subsidiary of the American media conglomerate Viacom since 1994. Paramount is the fifth oldest surviving film studio in the world, the second oldest in the …

Venice is a residential, commercial, and recreational beachfront neighborhood within Los Angeles, California. It is located within the urban region of western Los Angeles County known as the Westside. — Venice was founded in 1905 as a seaside resort town. It was an independent city until 1926, when …

Slapstick is a style of humor involving exaggerated physical activity which exceeds the boundaries of normal physical comedy. The term arises from a device developed during the broad, physical comedy style known as Commedia dell'arte in 16th Century Italy. The "slap stick" consists of two thin …

A slap stick

Advertisement for Punch and Judy showing Punch with his slapstick (1910)

Mutual Film Corporation was an early American film conglomerate best remembered today as the producers of some of Charlie Chaplin's greatest comedies. Founded in 1912, it was absorbed by Film Booking Offices of America, which evolved into RKO Pictures. — Founding — Mutual Film Corporation was …

Marie Dressler was a Canadian-American stage and screen actress, comedian, and early silent film and Depression-era film star. Successful on stage in vaudeville and comic operas, she was also successful in film. In 1914, she was in the …

The Keystone Cops were fictional, humorously incompetent policemen, featured in several silent film slapstick comedies produced by Mack Sennett for his Keystone Film Company between 1912 and 1917. — History — The idea for the Keystone Cops came from Hank Mann, who …

The Keystone Cops in a typical pose in In the Clutches of the Gang (1914). The chief, using the telephone, is Ford Sterling. The policeman directly behind Sterling (extreme background, left) is Edgar Kennedy. The young cop to Kennedy's left is Robert Cox. The hefty policeman at extreme right is Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle. The young constable with bulging eyes, fourth from right, is Arbuckle's nephew Al St. John. The casting of the Keystone police force changed from one film to the next; many of the individual members were per diem actors who remain unidentifiable.

Ford Sterling was an American comedian and actor best known for his work with Keystone Studios. One of the'Big 4', he was the original chief of the Keystone Cops. — Biography — Born in La Crosse, Wisconsin, he began his career in …

Harry Philmore Langdon was an American comedian who appeared in vaudeville, silent films, and talkies. — Life and career — Born in Council Bluffs, Iowa, Langdon began working in medicine shows and stock companies while in his …

Chester Cooper Conklin was an early American film comedian who started at Keystone Studios as one of Mack Sennett’s Keystone Cops, often paired with Mack Swain. He appeared in a series of films with Mabel Normand and worked closely with Charlie Chaplin, both …

Al St. John was an early American film comedian, and nephew of Roscoe “Fatty” Arbuckle, with whom he often appeared. He was employed by Mack Sennett and worked with many leading players such as Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton and Mabel Normand. In the talkies …

Edendale is a historical name for a district in Los Angeles, California, northwest of Downtown Los Angeles, in what is known today as Echo Park, Los Feliz and Silver Lake. — In the opening decades of the 20th century, in the era of silent movies, Edendale was widely known as the home of most major …

L.A. Noire is a neo-noir detective action-adventure video game developed by Team Bondi and published by Rockstar Games. It was released on May 2011 for PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360, in November 2011 for Microsoft Windows, and in November 2017 for Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. Set in …

When interrogating witnesses and suspects, players have the option to believe them, doubt them, or accuse them of lying

A film studio is a major entertainment company or motion picture company that has its own privately owned studio facility or facilities that are used to make films, which is handled by the production company. The majority of firms in the entertainment …

Variety is a weekly American entertainment trade magazine and website owned by Penske Media Corporation. It was founded by Sime Silverman in New York in 1905 as a weekly newspaper reporting on theater and vaudeville. In 1933 it added Daily Variety, based in Los Angeles, to cover the motion-picture …

Echo Park is a densely populated neighborhood of over 43,000 residents in Central Los Angeles. It contains one high school and eight other schools, and has been home to many notable people. The neighborhood is centered on the lake of the same name. — Geography — Location — Echo Park is …

Louise Fazenda was an American film actress, appearing chiefly in silent comedy films. — Early life — Fazenda was born in her maternal grandparents' house in Lafayette, Indiana. Fazenda grew up in California where she attended Los Angeles High School and St …

Raymond Griffith was a silent movie comedian. Later in his career, he worked behind the camera as writer and producer. — Biography — Griffith was born in Boston, Massachusetts. He lost his voice at an early age, causing him to speak for the rest of his life …

Swimming with Sharks is a 1994 American comedy-drama film written and directed by George Huang and starring Kevin Spacey, Frank Whaley and Michelle Forbes. — Plot — Buddy Ackerman, an influential movie mogul, hires Guy, a naïve young writer, as his …

The history of Syria covers events which occurred on the territory of the present Syrian Arab Republic and events which occurred in Syria. The present Syrian Arab Republic spans territory which was first unified in the 10th century BCE under the Neo-Assyrian Empire, the capital of which …

The Bugatti Type 41, better known as the Royale, is a large luxury car built from 1927 to 1933 with a 4.3 m wheelbase and 6.4 m overall length. It weighs approximately 3,175 kg and uses a 12.763 litre straight-eight engine. For comparison, against the …

Type 41 radiator cap

Most of the engines intended for the Royale were derated and found their way into a series of high-speed Bugatti railcars.

Ethan Green Hawke is an American actor, writer, and director. He has been nominated for four Academy Awards and a Tony Award. Hawke has directed three feature films, three Off-Broadway plays, and a documentary. He has also written three novels. — He made his film debut with …